Page 30 of Steal Me (Rebel Hearts Heists 1)
“River, I—” He squeezes my hand. “Kitten, I went from being the new poor kid, bullied everyday, to popular jock when I discovered my love for football. The same guys who beat the shit out of me in elementary school, all of a sudden wanted to be my friends. And then I’m the crazy motherfucker? Keira is the only person who’s ever cared about me, until you. I know you hate your ex but between me and him, in those woods you chose me. The guy that kept suggesting killing you. The one who was being a complete asshole to you. You saved me. Why?”
I shiver, feeling naked under his gaze but I try to explain my complicated, messy feelings. “My ex is a monster. You aren’t. I might be wrong but I saw something in your eyes, even when you said that you guys should ‘get rid of me’. I thought that you were just doing what the circumstances required, mostly. Somehow I thought you weren’t evil, just a crazy bastard,” I mumble honestly.
He chuckles. “Says you. A girl. Girls are all crazy anyway, this is why you get me, huh?”
“Douche!” I roll my eyes at his massive generalization, pulling my hand away from his. But he tightens his grip and scoots closer to me and brings my knuckles to his lips.
“You saved me, Sloane and then what happened in that room …”
“What, the stuff that didn’t mean anything? It was just a kiss, River. You don’t owe me anything.”
His lips are still on my knuckles, warm and soft. “It meant so fucking much to me, kitten. And I wanted you so much that I couldn’t even breathe. I just needed to make sure that kiss wasn’t just a reaction to the danger we were both in. The next time I kiss you, Sloane, I want it to be because you want it.”
I want to say that I wanted him that night and I do now but my eyes fall on the black ink on his knuckles and I finally make out the letters: ‘Josie’. “Who’s Josie?”
???
River
“Who’s Josie?” I stand up, dragging Sloane with me.
“I’ll show you, come on. We have one more stop beforehand though.” We walk to the other side of the mall in perfect silence, our hands still joined. I enter a shop that sells corporate uniforms of every kind: from chef whites, to suites to scrubs. And scrubs is just what we need: I grab a dark blue set in my size and then grab one in Sloane’s.
She follows me the whole time until I guide her in front of the bathrooms in the mall, open a door labeled ‘family bathroom’ and drag her inside, locking the door behind me.
“River, what kind of kinky shit—”
I smirk at her, amused by the redness that begins to bloom on her cheeks. “Put them on, kitten. Trust me, please?” And she nods, turning to face away from me while she puts on her scrubs.
I’ve seen her in her underwear and the fact that she’s trusting me right now, makes me so fucking hard for her that I’m tempted to grab her and fuck her against this public bathroom’s wall. But I take a deep breath and tell myself that first I have to make sure that she understands who I am.
Then we’ll see if she’ll still want me, because if she didn’t, I’d never touch her. We leave our shopping bags at the hotel and take a bus to San Francisco Memorial. Sloane's hand is in mine the whole time, but I don’t miss the rigid set in her shoulders and the worried glances she throws at me every time she thinks I’m not looking at her. I know she probably thinks that this is one of my crazy stunts, but she’ll get it when she meets Josie.
San Francisco Memorial is huge and it’s easy to get mixed up with the crowds of staff and visitors. I follow behind a doctor all the way into the pediatric ward and when he rounds a corner I stop, holding Sloane back. Once he’s gone, I open the door to room three-two-five and my heart immediately clenches painfully in my chest when I see the small body in the hospital bed with so many tubes and monitors attached to her.
“River, what—” Sloane’s tone is worried as we stand by the closed room door and I’m about to explain, when my niece opens her eyes and squeals in delight.
“Uncle Riv!” I let Sloane’s hand go, I don’t even think that she would run. If she wanted to, I guess this would be the right time and place.
Would I blame her? Not entirely.
I hug Josie and kiss her forehead: she looks thinner than the last time I saw her a couple of months ago. “How are you doing, baby girl?”
Josie doesn’t reply, she hates talking about surgeries and doctors and anything that has to do with why she’s in the hospital. And it pisses me off that at five years old, she has to even know about all this suffering. “Mommy said that you won a big trophy! Can I see it?”
I take her into my arms, careful not to spook any of the machines she’s attached to and explain how the State Championship cup has to stay at school. “But I brought you your Christmas present early, love bug.” I give her the only bag I have with me, I went to the toy store while Sloane was shopping.
I help my niece to take out the plush dolls in the bag. “They’re Elsa and Anna! I love them! Uncle Riv, who’s that girl by the door? Is she my new doctor?”
I beckon Sloane over and I explain to Josie in a way I hope a five year old can understand. “This is my friend Sloane, love bug.”
Josie gives Sloane a once over and then winks at me. I swear my niece is five going on twenty five. “She’s too pretty for you, uncle Riv.”
I chuckle and place a soft kiss on Josie’s blonde head. I’d like to stay and hang out all day but I don’t want anyone to see me here. Royce is right that we need to be inconspicuous because when the others took Sloane, they made a huge mistake.
Before, no one had any idea of who the mysterious bank robbers in the Avengers masks were. Now we have a hostage they know the identity of and this puts as at risk of being identified too. Especially since her ex is on our tail and I can’t stop thinking about the police that pulled us over right after our last job. If that cop remembers seeing Sloane in the car with us, we’re busted.
This is why I tried to blend in here at the hospital, so no one can remember seeing me here. I give Josie another cuddle and then Sloane and I slip out of the room as quietly as we came in. We take a cab back to the hotel and as soon as the car door is closed, she takes my hand. Her jade green eyes are intense.
“I didn’t know you had a niece. Why is Josie in the hospital?”
I sigh because it’s still hard to open up and because I hate the injustice of it all, of how life delivers random blows to people who don’t deserve them. A kid never deserves to be sick, never. Still, Sloane deserves an answer. Hell, Sloane deserves a hell of a lot more than I can probably give her. But I’m still going to try.
“Keira got pregnant by her boyfriend when I was a junior in high school. Josie’s sperm donor moved in with us, they got engaged. Josie was born with a rare heart condition and she was in the hospital for the entire first year of her life. She’ll probably need constant surgeries until she’s much older. And the advances of technology and medicine are amazing, if she’d been born, let’s say ten years earlier, she might have not made it this far. Obviously her loser dad couldn’t cope with the stress and the constant hospitalizations his daughter required and left. His job covered some of the medical expenses but still left Keira buried in medical bills. She had to sell the house our parents left us and it still wasn’t enough. Especially when her ex got laid off and all of a sudden there was no health insurance. I worked part time in high school but my apprentice mechanic wage didn’t help for shit.”
I stop talking because the sense of powerlessness and defeat I felt until I met Royce and the others comes back in a fresh wave of pain. We almost lost Josie because we had no insurance and she needed a life saving surgery. I was desperate for a solution to save the girl I love the most in the entire world.
As if understanding my silence, Sloane examines my face and squeezes my hand, tucking her body further against me. My heart beats an unsteady rhythm and I have a feeling that life is about to get very complicated.
